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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28498509">Red Keep</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDameintheRaininMaine/pseuds/TheDameintheRaininMaine'>TheDameintheRaininMaine</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Edwardian, Arya's a baby suffragette, Class Issues, Edwardian Period, F/M, Sansa's not far behind, and gendry's a gardener, arya's a housemaid, based a little bit on Downton abbey but more on PBS's Manor House, in which I am a history nerd</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 17:40:23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>13,421</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28498509</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDameintheRaininMaine/pseuds/TheDameintheRaininMaine</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Arya was once a wild child. Daughter of a Scottish solicitor, and from a large loving family, she sometimes fought with what she thought her future would be. </p><p>Now her family is smaller, and her station reduced. Working as a maid in a country estate far grander than what her own childhood held, her life has transformed. She may find that love comes upon unexpectedly, and that the future could change more rapidly than she could have ever dreamed.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Arya Stark &amp; Sansa Stark, Arya Stark/Gendry Waters</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>98</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Ugh, I hate the title. Suggestions for changes are greatly appreciated.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Arya wakes at the crack of dawn. She rolls over in her narrow bed. She never thought she would miss sharing a bed with Sansa. She lays perfectly still, as long as can be allowed. Only Weasel is out of bed before her, lighting the kitchen range and scrubbing the floors for the chef and kitchen maids. </p><p>When 6:30 comes, she rolls over and groans. She wishes she could even share with Willow and Jeyne, but once Weasel is up, it’s just her up here behind the attic wall. Winter’s just begun and it’s freezing in the tiny room.</p><p>She begins to dress all alone. At least that will be her excuse if anyone realizes how loosely she laces her corset, valuing her ability to twist and bend more than fashion. Like it even mattered, no one cares how a housemaid looks under her rough blue uniform. Her apron hides her rough stitching on the inside pocket, and the odd hanging it gives to her skirt. She tucks her secret possession in that pocket. She dons the cap without a word, hoping with all her hope that it will stay on today. </p><p>Down to the kitchen she goes, and her and Jeyne, the other housemaid, help prepare the tea trays to send up. Arya always prepares the one that goes to Sansa, to be delivered to the mistress of the house, Lady Cersei Baratheon. Jeyne’s sister Willow, the kitchen maid, helps them before she begins making the servants’ breakfasts. </p><p>On a bad day, this is the only time Arya even sees her sister. Her red hair is wrapped up in a braid looped up and on her head, not a strand out of place, before her mistress has even risen and bathed. </p><p>Arya’s stomach growls after the trays go up, but it’s not time for breakfast yet.</p><p>Once that’s finished, her and Jeyne split. As the senior housemaid, Jeyne works on the front rooms, dusting and sweeping, ignoring the silver, that is only to be touched by Mr Kettleblack, the butler. Arya’s task is to go to each of the bedrooms and light the fires without waking the inhabitants. </p><p>Which is much easier done when the coal box is filled. </p><p>“Lommy must have forgotten again,” Arya mutters as she mucks out to the coal house on her own. There’s a light dusting of snow on the ground. She tries not to curse him. The morning task of emptying the chamber pots had been hers until Lommy had been brought on as hallboy. </p><p>Scraping out the hearths of ash and lighting the fires is heavy, hot, tiring work. Arya doesn’t mind. She’s not afraid of work, or of getting dirty. She counts down the bedrooms, the Master and Mistress’, the nursery and younger children’s rooms. The oldest son is away at boarding school, so that’s one less. After lighting the fires, she will change into a clean apron and bring each bedroom hot water, her arms aching from carrying the buckets. Afterwards, she throws open the curtains, which is far less taxing, in each of the family's bedroom. And also to the rooms of any guests staying at the Red Keep, and there were often many. </p><p>Thankfully today, they are none, and Arya’s stomach is barely growling by the time she can return to the kitchen for her breakfast. </p><p>By the time Arya gets her bowl, Sansa’s already shoveling hers down. At least she didn’t miss her today. She must make it upstairs again to help the mistress dress. The other servants at the table eye her warily. Many think she must be spying on them. Arya wonders if one day she will one day be suspicious of her own sister. </p><p>She tries not to linger on memories of when Sansa would help her dress and do her hair. She had always fussed so, hating having to wear dresses she knew she would get dirty and be scolded for. Hated having to hold still while Sansa pulled her hair, muttering about how the elves must have got at it in the night. It was no matter, now Sansa spent her mornings dressing and doing the hair of a grown lady, as though she were still a child. </p><p>Then comes time for the family’s breakfast. </p><p>It seems sad, Arya thinks, that the master and mistress eat in the dining room all their lonesome, their children eating in the nursery with the nurse and governess. But the spread they eat is far grander than the servants porridge. Eggs, bacon, sausages. Kippers and fruit and fine pastries. Sharna was a fine cook, trained in France, and she said the boy she’d taken on as an apprentice showed great promise. The other servants only called him Hot Pie. </p><p>But before they could eat, all the servants had to gather for Lady Cersei to read prayers. This was the bit of the day that angered Arya the most, that they just had to stand, like they didn’t stand all the rest of the day, and listen to her moralize. </p><p>But once the family leaves for their breakfast, only Tom and Lem, the footmen, need to accompany them. Now is time for orders from Mr Kettleblack and Mrs Heddle, the housekeeper. </p><p>Arya doesn’t fear this. God knows she skirts the rules plenty, but she doesn’t attract attention and does all her work to a ‘T’. And Mrs Heddle is imposing, but she is not frightening, nor unfair. </p><p>Everyone pauses for a drink of tea, the hot liquid pushing energy into all of Arya’s limbs before she begins the bulk of her daily work. </p><p>Up the stairs, for what seems like the hundredth time today already. Arya gathers the laundry and passes it to Jeyne to sort out once she finishes dusting and sweeping in the drawing rooms and library. Then Arya sets out to clean and tidy the bedrooms. </p><p>Make the beds, retrieving new linens today. Dust, tidy. This wasn’t particularly difficult. Much work in the master and mistresses rooms were handled by Sansa, and Lancel, the master’s valet. Myrcella and Tommen could be careless as all children could be, but they weren’t slovenly. Arya shivers, thinking of the state she’d found guest bedrooms before. Then when she was nearly done, dragging the ewbank sweeper over all the carpets. </p><p>Oh how Arya hated that damn sweeper.</p><p>When she’s working in Myrcella’s bedroom, the girl returns from lessons, having forgotten something. Remembering the rules, Arya stands still, facing the nearest wall, until the girl leaves. It gets under her skin. Myrcella was a child, why must she ignore her so?</p><p>She’s just finished Tommen’s when she hears the bell ring. Time for lunch. </p><p>Lunch is simple, but substantial, leftovers from last night’s sumptuous spread in the big dining room. Arya is grateful for Willow keeping them so well fed. After a long morning, the staff all need it. Arya tries not to stuff herself, not needing to make herself slothful in the afternoon. </p><p>Sansa, sitting beside her, quietly whispers, </p><p>“I heard the sounds from upstairs again.”</p><p>Arya rolls her eyes. </p><p>“Mice again, I’ll tell Mrs. Heddle we need to put out the traps in the upstairs corridors.”</p><p>She groans inwardly. Emptying the traps always seemed to fall to her. </p><p>Sansa makes a face, but doesn’t say anything else. Nobody’s supposed to speak during mealtimes, Mrs Heddle and Mr Kettleblack only looking the other way for her and Sansa because they’re sisters, and Arya suspects their leniency will only last for a few moments at the beginning of the meal.</p><p>Lunch finishes up, and it’s time for the Baratheon’s to have dinner. Arya once again finds herself, standing upright between Jeyne and Willow. </p><p>Once dinner is finished, Arya tells Mrs Heddle about Sansa’s noises. </p><p>She nods, </p><p>“I’ll set the traps later today.”</p><p>Afterwards, Arya counts down. She rechecks every fire, relighting the ones that have gone out. Then come the hallways, then the big staircase. The only time she’s allowed on it is when sweeping the carpet, the servant’s corridors set neatly in the back and behind things, so that they can move about without being seen. As a child, she might have found that thrilling. Then she goes down to help Jeyne finish up getting the laundry ready for for Alys, the laundry maid, and checking through the other loads she’s returned to them. </p><p>There’s only one item they find today needing mending. Jeyne takes it promptly. </p><p>“I can’t believe you were willing to do all the mending if I did all the fires,” Arya comments. </p><p>Jeyne raises an eyebrow. </p><p>“You told me you’d be sacked the same day if you mended anything. I believed you and the girl before you was useless, so I’ll keep up with the mending.”</p><p>Arya suppresses the desire to hug her. The solid rectangle presses into her knees. </p><p>She counts down. The bedrooms, the common rooms, the laundry. She hasn’t heard a single bell. Her ladyship was probably out riding or calling, his Lordship out visiting a drinking friend, the children at their lessons in the nursery. </p><p>She checks the time. Two o’clock. Teatime was at five, she would need a half hour before to change. Two and half hours that if the bells behaved, she would have to herself. </p><p>This would have never happened if there were guests, or if Joffrey was home from school, or if Mrs Heddle had made her and Jeyne scrub the dining room for company, or the library…</p><p>She wasn’t going to let it go to waste. </p><p>She walks in light-footed silence to the second floor. At the hallway leading past the guest bedrooms, the curtains curve. They pull to one side, beside the big windows. </p><p>They hide the little staircase. </p><p>Arya steps onto it and climbs. Outside down, there is a ledge, not quite a balcony, but enough for a few people to sit, if they don’t mind their feet dangling. It’s hangs just a little, about halfway between the first and second story, and it’s head is squashed by the balcony above it, one of the ones in a closed up guest bedroom. It sits above the in-between servant's corridor with the half-window, where the wall of bells to summon them hang. No one else knows this spot is here. She imagines it must be some sort of architectural oddity from the person who designed the house. Robb used to know some of things like that. Before.</p><p>She removes her book from where it is tucked under her skirts. </p><p>Arya had managed to only bring three books with her to Red Keep. Mrs Heddle had given them side-eye when she’d unpacked her first day here, with a warning not to get caught reading on the job. Arya hasn’t been caught yet.</p><p>Northanger Abbey, Robinson Crusoe. And today, the Adventures of Robin Hood. </p><p>All of the adventures she was never going to get to have. </p><p>She’s just a few pages into Robin sneaking into the archery competition in disguise when she hears the clank, and the curse. </p><p>Arya jumps. She’s had one ear open, straining for the tiniest sound of a bell, but clearly not been listening to her direct surroundings. </p><p>The source of the sound is quickly discovered. There’s a gardener trimming one of the blue roses that climb up along the outside of this wall of the estate. Arya knows they are prized in this part of England, blooming even in the winter as it is now. They crawl all over the balconies and hang over the ledge Arya’s sitting on, helping to obscure it. He appears to have dropped his clippers, and they’ve landed in the rose vine beside where Arya is sitting, shaking loose snowflakes. He curses again, and doesn’t seem to see her. </p><p>(He’s even on a ladder, and Arya still didn’t see or hear him, it’s a disgrace she thinks. She’s losing her touch)</p><p>She reaches and pulls the clippers from the thorny vines and extends her arm to him. </p><p>“Here.”</p><p>He climbs part way down his ladder to grab them. He blinks in shock, seeing her, she realizes, for probably the first time too. He’s younger than the master gardener, Mister Mott, perhaps just of age. He’s got black hair and bright blue eyes, and he’s wearing flat cap on his head and a shirt and braces with rough-hewn trousers, no doubt used to the ground and dirt.</p><p>Arya is frozen in one spot, and the gardener seems the same. Her voice rushes out, hasty and pleading, a tone she hasn't used since childhood.</p><p>“I won’t tell that you cursed if you won’t tell that I’m out here.”</p><p>He’s got a look in his eye, and she suspects his curiosity is going to get the best of him. </p><p>“What are you even doing out here?”</p><p>She points the cover of her book at him. </p><p>She tilts her head towards where the roses are climbing. </p><p>“Trimming the roses?”</p><p>He nods. </p><p>“Mistress wants them perfect, even though it’s winter and they keep getting covered in snow...and I’m the only gardener under forty, so if it involves a ladder, I get to do it…”</p><p>He trails off. It’s so strange, there’s so many servants in this huge house, and they so rarely get to speak to each other about work. As a gardener, he wouldn’t even eat his meals in the big house, wouldn’t be welcome inside. </p><p>With a rush of defiance to propriety, she interjects. </p><p>“I’m Arya.”</p><p>He blinks, as though he's not quite sure how he's supposed to speak to her. Arya doesn't understand. He doesn't look diminished in any way, though perhaps he is just stupid. She's known this to afflict men of all classes. At least he didn't fall over himself to apologize for cursing in front of her. </p><p>“Gendry,” then a long pause, and he continues. </p><p>“Do they know you’re out here?”</p><p>She shakes her head. </p><p>He nods briefly. </p><p>“I’ll move on then, don’t want to call attention.”</p><p>And he returns to his roses, and Arya, mildly disappointed, to Robin and Marian. She watches him out of the corner of her eye carefully. She's curious about him.</p><p>“How often do the roses need trimming?”</p><p>“Every week it seems. You have to trim off the dead bits or they don’t grow bigger come spring.”</p><p>Arya files that away.</p><p>Before he climbs far enough down the ladder that she can no longer see him, she thinks she sees him watching her. His eyes are blue, very blue. </p><p>But soon, Arya’s skin begins to twitch and she pads back inside and down to the basement, just fast enough to hear a bell rung in one of the drawing rooms. The mistress had spilled a glass of wine. Arya cleans is swiftly before returning to the basement and changing one more time.</p><p>Tea time comes, and trays of scones are rushed from the kitchen. The servants eat their supper afterwards, then preparations for the large family dinner begin. Arya doesn’t understand how their lifestyle can require four meals a day. She’s caught glimpses of the master of the house, and thinks that that must be why he’s so vast.</p><p>Her and Jeyne tidy the downstairs rooms as the family returns, and when supper is served, return upstairs. Jeyne closes the curtains and lays out night clothes, while Arya ends her work day much the way she began, kneeling on the iron fire grates, scraping soot and lighting fires. Her apron is black before the end of the second fire.</p><p>Then they wait. </p><p>Finally, the mistress is ready to retire, and the bell rings, and Arya goes up to help Sansa get ready for bed once she has finished her day. </p><p>“I don’t think the noises sound like mice,” she mentions idly, while Arya unlaces her corset and helps her out of it. She shakes her head at Sansa’s fancy. She always loved gothic novels, with mystery and secrets and romance to be found in houses like this. She doesn’t tease her as she once might have. Sansa looks as exhausted as her, having spent the day at the beck and call of a woman who seemed to think of her as one of the newfangled machines found in city factories.</p><p>When Arya ascends the servant’s stairs to return to the attic bedrooms, she only has Weasel to unlace her. She wishes she could do it herself. </p><p>Laying in her narrow bed, Arya tries not to remember too much. She tries not to think about the stone house up in Scotland. Tries not to remember when Father and Robb were still alive, tries not to wonder if Bran would get sick again, or if Rickon would even remember her, if she were to see them again. Tries not to remember when Mother was hopeful that her finding work was all they would need. </p><p>Tries not to think about how she got to go to school then. Got to play with her friends, even if she got scolded. Got to eat with her whole family and laugh and go to sleep in bed with her sister, not completed exhausted to the bone by her whole day.</p><p>Christmas a couple of weeks ago had been the worst. Even if the preparations hadn’t worked her fingers to the bone, no one here had even heard of Hogmanay. </p><p>She tries to force her mind away, and she finds it drifting to Gendry, the gardener she’d met trimming the roses earlier in the day. He was friendly enough, even if he swore, and he had lovely eyes.</p><p>She remembers when her and Sansa first came to Red Keep. She had plead with Mother, couldn’t she take a position working in the stable or the garden? The pay was better, and she would be better at it. She would be much happier too, dealing with horses or flowers instead of dust and linens, though she knew that didn’t factor into the equation. Mother had just shaken her head. That was men’s work, it wasn’t even worth asking. And Arya’s last hope had died when it was discovered that there were no openings in the nursery. She would spend her days working sunup to sundown, speaking to barely anyone, trying to be invisible. </p><p>As Arya falls asleep, her thoughts stay on Gendry, and how talking to him, for the first time in her two years at Red Keep, she felt truly seen.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>By the time Arya speaks to the gardener again, England has a new king. </p>
<p>Not that it she has many positive opinions on the topic, being Scottish. Though she suspects there may be a celebration of some sort coming that she might enjoy.</p>
<p>She’s not thinking about that though. The next time she sees Gendry, she’s fuming. </p>
<p>The previous weeks had been one evening party after another, with work stretching into the night, leaving Arya so tired she could barely turn around after falling into bed. It had been the first day without guests in many days.</p>
<p>Arya’s day had begun difficult enough. Deep in winter, no matter how mild it was here down south in comparison to Scotland, Arya had woken to the water in her basin frozen. A line had been scraped into the ice, to show that Weasel had found the water in the same state. </p>
<p>Later in the morning, her and Jeyne had been cleaning the library, as they did at least twice a week. Sometimes she wonders if the Master had ever set foot in here, or if all the shelves full of books were just for show. Sansa had said the Mistress didn’t seem the academic sort either. She thinks that the room is probably only used for the Master of the house and his guests to smoke their foul cigars.</p>
<p>Arya had lifted edge of the carpet, to sweep the dust from underneath, and found a single shilling. She knows the game. </p>
<p>With a sigh, she turns to Jeyne. </p>
<p>“Is your Mum still in the kitchen working up the bread?”</p>
<p>After the nod, Arya had taken the shilling and made a beeline for the staircase down the back of the hall into the basement. </p>
<p>She found Mrs Heddle, gave her the time and room, and waited patiently while she made a note of it. </p>
<p>If she had kept the shilling, she would have been dismissed for theft. If she had left it where she found it, she might have still been dismissed for carelessness. </p>
<p>She’s been working at Red Keep nearly two years and was still considered to be this untrustworthy.</p>
<p>Even Mrs Heddle had shaken her head. </p>
<p>“I’ve never known a mistress to be so concerned as to the manners of her maids in a clean and well-run home. I wouldn’t hire a maid of poor character, much less keep her this long.”</p>
<p>This is what Arya’s ruminating on while she reads Robinson Crueso. </p>
<p>“What’s eating at you?” a voice asks her. Arya jumps, and recognizes her gardener, having plopped his ladder right beside the ledge she’s seated upon.</p>
<p>And she’s so fired up, she tells him. </p>
<p>“Spent my morning having my work and morals questioned by our employers for no real reason.”</p>
<p>“Ahh,’ is Gendry’s response. “Makes me happy that all I ever seem to see of our employers are the little ones who sometimes run about the gardens. The girl even has her own little vegetable patch.”</p>
<p>Arya nods, but in her head she’s still angry. </p>
<p>“I can’t imagine my mother every behaving that way to one of our servants. I can’t imagine it either.’</p>
<p>To her further anger, he snorts in response. </p>
<p>“Does milady fancy herself a kind and benevolent mistress who seeks to guide her staff to moral righteousness with a gentle hand?”</p>
<p>Her anger flares in her chest. She knows he has no way of knowing. He couldn’t. No one outside of Scotland would know that the Starks had once been an important name, among the old Highland clans. Even in Scotland, those days were gone. And he had no way of knowing her immediate family’s struggle.</p>
<p>“My father was a solicitor,” she tells him, “A learned man. I had five siblings and we lived in Scotland, in a stone house on a hillside. We had a cook and an upstairs maid, and we called them by name.’</p>
<p>She also was among the kitchen and the upstairs so much, trying to help, to listen, to learn so much, that they both had taken to calling her Arya Underfoot. But they had loved her, Father had assured her, everyone in that little stone house that had now been sold along with everything in it.</p>
<p>She keeps going, though he looks suitably chastised. </p>
<p>“And now I’m a maid, a nobody. What remains of my family has scattered. And though I have been here two years, working sunup to sundown despite my birth, I’m considered no more trustworthy than someone come in off the street.”</p>
<p>Gendry opens his mouth, and then briefly closes it, as if contemplating. Perhaps he’s not stupid as she had thought.</p>
<p>“‘M sorry,” he tells her, then changing the subject, “So you’ve been working here for two years?”</p>
<p>Arya nods. </p>
<p>“My mum worked here first, as the governess-”</p>
<p>Gendry cuts her off, his eyes wide. </p>
<p>“Governess? Not the one who-”</p>
<p>Arya nods again. She and Sansa had barely been in the house two months when scarlet fever had swept the nursery, sickening both of the children, along with Mum and two of the nurses. Mum had been the unlucky one.</p>
<p>Gendry’s shoulders slump in sympathy. </p>
<p>“My mum died when I was little too,” he tells her, “Fever too. I know it’s rough.”</p>
<p>“Do you remember her?”</p>
<p>He shakes his head. </p>
<p>“Not much. I remember she had yellow hair, and she sometimes would sing. I was in the workhouse for a few years, before someone found a note from her at a church, telling them to send me here. I don’t know what the note said, but because of it I got the job with Mr Mott. I was twelve by then.” </p>
<p>Arya blinks, and looks at his face, trying to count.</p>
<p>“Twelve? How old are you now?”</p>
<p>Gendry smiles softly, </p>
<p>“I turn nineteen this summer. That’s nearly seven years.”</p>
<p>Arya’s eyes go wide. Working the gardens isn’t exactly light labor. That explains the rather solid set of shoulders under his shirt. </p>
<p>“I was fifteen last September. Isn’t is strange though? How we’ve both worked here for so long and have never bumped into each other.”</p>
<p>Gendry’s smile turns rueful. </p>
<p>“I don’t think they would approve of the inside the house servants speaking to the outside of the house folks. I think they’ve got you all quite convinced you’re much better off inside. I don’t think we’re permitted past the kitchen, even then only when we’re bringing in produce from the kitchen garden.”</p>
<p>Arya chews her lip for a moment in thought, then is hit by a sudden realization. </p>
<p>“Oh! You’re the ogre Willow always says brings her the best onions.”</p>
<p>Gendry turns a little red and sputters. Ignoring this, Arya suddenly has dozens of questions. She’s never gotten to go inside either of the walled gardens, the big one the mistress took guests through, or the squat kitchen garden that all the kitchen’s vegetables and much of their fruit was grown in. But…</p>
<p>She holds up her book. </p>
<p>“I should be getting back to work. Maybe next time I’ll find out what is going to happen to Robinson Crusoe.”</p>
<p>“What’s he up to?” Gendry asks idly, as he returns to the roses in front of him.</p>
<p>“A man who left home to become a sailor because he thought he had it too easy at home and ended up getting stranded on a deserted island.”</p>
<p>“Sounds like a total bellend.”</p>
<p>She laughs. He’s not wrong. And then she puts her book away and returns to work, somewhat less incensed.</p>
<p>The end of winter is fairly slow. The evening parties slow down and it’s the wrong time of year for the master to have many shooting parties. </p>
<p>But with the coming of spring comes the coming of the Season, and also of spring cleaning.</p>
<p>Arya is most concerned about the latter of course, but in their handful of private moments between themselves, Sansa is most concerned about the former. </p>
<p>“You weren’t there last year Arya,” she says, shaking her head, while Arya unlaces her. </p>
<p>“I might not be there this year either,” Arya interjects. Last year when the rest of the household had gone to London for the season, her, Jeyne and Mrs Heddle had stayed and scrubbed the house top to bottom, cleaning things that it would have never even occurred to Arya to touch. It had still somehow been like a holiday. </p>
<p>Sansa shakes her head again.</p>
<p>“Events and parties and balls five nights a week. They had us up waiting until two in the morning some days, a half dozen changes just for dinner. And everyone’s so exacting. Mistress smacked me across the face with the back of her hand mirror once when I accidentally pricked her with a hair pin..and Myrcella comes out in two years, so I’ll be needing to train her a new maid soon.”</p>
<p>Arya bites her tongue from saying ‘as long as that maid’s not me’. She had gotten roped into playing lady’s maid for a guest a time or two before, ones who came calling and did not have her own, and it was not an event she wished to repeat. </p>
<p>“I spoke to the gardener I mentioned to you again today.”</p>
<p>Sansa reaches back and carefully squeezes Arya’s arm just over her shoulder. </p>
<p>“Don’t get yourself in trouble Arya,” she tells her. Arya wants to argue back, wants to whine like she would have years ago when Sansa told her not to do something she wanted to do, but she knows what she means. “I would hate being stuck here without you.”</p>
<p>She leaves for bed again, wondering once again what Mum and Dad would have wanted her to do here. </p>
<p>Mum would at least be pleased she was dressed properly, and behaving. When Arya was young, it seemed as though nearly everything she did made her mother scold her. Part of the reason she had worked so hard in school was because she realized that good marks had made her mother proud of her. </p>
<p>Part of Arya feels like she would be slightly ashamed, Dad too, realizing they were the parents of a maid. Governess was a position requiring learning, and class, and many women in Catelyn Stark’s unfortunate position took such a job. But girls from good families weren’t supposed to be maids. Weren’t supposed to work at all, though Arya never understood the shame behind it</p>
<p>(And they definitely weren’t supposed to be consorting with men unescorted. Especially not gardeners. Not that it would have shocked either of her parents. Back when she was still in school, her closest friend was the butcher’s son).</p>
<p>The Scottish in Arya’s bone is saddened at the loss of the snow as spring approaches. But the rest of her appreciates the increase in sunlight. </p>
<p>And true to Sansa’s worry, the time came for the family to pack up and leave for London. </p>
<p>Arya watches Sansa from afar during this time. </p>
<p>It was true that the Stark name did not hold the meaning it once did, but they were still a respectable family, their father was a professional man after all. Sansa hoped long and hard as a young girl to fall in love and marry well and get to go live in a big house with many servants and be able to wear beautiful gowns. She would have longed to come out in her own season, if that had been part of her world. Now she attended a woman who barely even seemed to enjoy it.</p>
<p>Sansa had whispered to her before that she did not think the master and mistress had a particularly happy marriage. </p>
<p>“And every time they have to attend something together, it’s like it upsets her whole day. She doesn’t smile often as is, but I’ve never seen her smile with him. In fact, being around him seems to make her even angrier.”</p>
<p>The idea is quite alien to them. Their parents marriage had, to their childish eyes anyway, been quite happy.</p>
<p>And Arya admits, Sansa is in quite an unusual place, as the mistress’s Lady’s maid. She wears her own clothes, not a uniform, and is always referred to by her surname. </p>
<p>Despite this, it is obvious she is still a maid. She had been visibly brightened the first time she had been given some of the mistresses cast off clothing, only to realize there was nowhere appropriate to wear it. If she had tried, there would be whispers everywhere that she was getting above herself, above her station, putting on airs. And so, she had given them to the church collection. </p>
<p>Now she will get to spend months dressing the mistress for the balls and theater parties and garden showings that she might have dreamed one day for herself. </p>
<p>And despite Arya’s thoughts lingering, the process continues. Bags and trunks are packed, and most of the rooms are shut up, curtains closed, everything laid with sheets to keep the dust off. </p>
<p>And Arya is told by Mrs Heddle that she will be staying behind for this season, but has a surprise in store. </p>
<p>“Mistress feels strongly this year that she would prefer to keep most of the household staff with her in London instead of hiring locally. Jeyne will go along with the entourage. I will remain behind to begin the spring cleaning with you for a fortnight, and then I will depart to join them. M’lady doesn’t believe she could keep the accounts in London without me there for long.”</p>
<p>Her tone is dry, and nearly derisive. And Arya’s curious mind gets the best of her. </p>
<p>“Why did she choose me to stay behind instead of Jeyne?”</p>
<p>Mrs Heddle shakes her head again. </p>
<p>“She felt that being among high society might be more tempting to you than my Jeyne, and she did not wish you to forget your place.”</p>
<p>The rage bubbles up inside Arya all over again. But she will not admit that she does not consider being left behind in Red Keep a punishment. </p>
<p>The night before the party is set to leave, Arya hugs more people than she has in ages. Sansa, of course, who cries, and then Jeyne and Willow. </p>
<p>“I’ll think of you with every spilled Madeira,” Jeyne assures her, and Willow begs her to take care of Hot Pie, the cook’s boy being left too. </p>
<p>“I’m not sure if he’ll even realize we’re gone and might try and keep going as if everyone’s still here, he might not know what to do. Weasel should help out with that too.”</p>
<p>That’s the whole of what’s left of the household in the morning. Her and Mrs Heddle, Hot Pie and Weasel. Tom (or Lem, Arya’s not quite sure which, not that he’ll give Arya any nevermind even now) to answer the door and the phone and clean the chimney. </p>
<p>And the outside staff. There’s no need for more horses than needed for the carriage in London, but the rest of them still need to be cared for. Sansa and Arya have both wondered if one of these days the Master might return home with one of those newfangled motorcars, and the stable boys would be out a job. </p>
<p>And the gardeners, Arya notes in her head. It makes sense, spring and summer are some of their most important seasons.</p>
<p>When Arya wakes the first day after everyone leaves, the house feels so empty, so quiet, so still.</p>
<p>She eats breakfast in the kitchen. Hot Pie stirs up porridge and puts the kettle on, and Weasel and her eat their bowls side by side. Tom (or Lem) has already finished when she comes down, and Mrs Heddle settles for a cup of tea, telling Arya to meet her in the foyer once she’s finished. Weasel will spend her time here for the season doing spring cleaning too, but she will be cleaning the servants quarters and corridors, bits no one ever sees but them. </p>
<p>“Has spring started yet?” she asks Arya over breakfast. Without Mr Kettleblack or the other senior servants there, there’s much less pressure to be silent during meals. “I always liked seeing the trees start to bloom. I miss the sun.”</p>
<p>Arya looks Weasel up and down. The girl is maybe thirteen years old, possibly even younger. She had come to them from the workhouse, and scullery maid was the lowest role in the whole house. Even Willow, despite being above Weasel in the hierarchy, spoke of the days when she only saw the sun when she went to the servant’s door for deliveries. When she got to get them. Weasel is thin, and deathly pale. Arya doesn’t think it can possibly be good for her. </p>
<p>After breakfast, Arya goes to find Mrs Heddle and the work starts. The first day, they spend their time going through each room and taking down all the curtains and drapes. Arya feels like some of them must weigh more than she does. She helps fold and drag them out the servants entrance, where they pack them up to be sent to the laundry with Alys. </p>
<p>By the time they’re done, Arya’s feet ache and her muscles burn. She heaves a breath, and wipes her brow. They’d stopped to eat dinner, bread and cold sliced beef, but now it’s not yet time for tea. Despite this, Mrs Heddle rubs two hands on the small of her back and declares that that’s been plenty for a day’s work.</p>
<p>Northanger Abbey bumps against Arya’s thighs, but she’s not really in the mood for Catherine Moreland right now. While they may have had some in common as children, Arya felt that the nearly grown Miss Moreland in her worst moments was far too much like Sansa in her worst. </p>
<p>“Mrs Heddle,” Arya asks, slowly, piecing together the rules that have been pounded into her skull, “Since it’s not yet time for tea, and the family is all out, could I take a walk through the gardens before returning to the house?”</p>
<p>Mrs Heddle nods in assent before turning and returning to the house herself. And in that moment, Arya’s alone. </p>
<p>It’s a queer feeling. Even in the attic, she rarely felt alone. There was always someone nearby, whether or not it was someone she should acknowledge. </p>
<p>The stone walkway out the backdoor cuts through the middle of the lawn. This was where Mistress held garden parties when the weather permitted. On one side laid a sculpture of a lion, supposedly brought from the Mistresses childhood home. Arya doesn’t care for it. </p>
<p>Soon the path forks, leading to the two walled gardens. One is the ornate formal garden, with flowering roses (colors other than blue) crawling upon the walls, filled with fountains and delicate benches to sit on. The other is the short, but functional kitchen garden. </p>
<p>Arya know which she prefers. </p>
<p>Her neck is just beginning to sweat when she steps through the gate, and she removes her cap, using it to wipe her neck before rebelliously tucking it in her apron. Her arms and legs are already beginning to feel better being stretched, when she spots him. </p>
<p>He’s near the east wall, kneeling over a bed of seedlings. The tree above him is in bloom, apple she thinks. A blossom or two falls upon Arya as she watches him. The day is warm enough that he’s just in his shirtsleeves, and her heart skips a beat when she realizes the fabric’s gone a bit transparent, and she can see his muscles working underneath it. His cap is drifting over his eyes, and she suspects he does not see her. There’s a wheelbarrow full of brown beside him that he’s spreading around the seedlings with a trowel. Arya’s been around horses, she knows it for what it is. </p>
<p>But soon enough, Gendry sits back on his heels, and spots her, falling onto his backside. As he jolts to his feet, fixing his cap, Arya giggles loudly. There’s no one out here to scold her for that. </p>
<p>“Don’t you belong in the house, milady?” he asks, a tiny note of mocking in his voice. She hopes the appellation doesn’t become a nickname. </p>
<p>“I like it better out here,” she declares. </p>
<p>The end of the day, in the setting sun, is so nice that when Arya ascends the servants staircase to return to the attic, she barely even hears the soft thudding noises above her head.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>First bit of historical re-arranging- Easter in 1902 was in March, but I've placed it here in mid April</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The fortnite before Mrs Heddle leaves for London is still busy with work. Three days later, once the wash has been returned from the laundry, they have to replace the curtains and drapes. They have to move all the furniture to polish and dust. The rugs are beaten more deeply than usual. </p>
<p>It’s just as dreary as usual, but Arya still feels better than she did. And at times, when the work is finished, she is allowed a few more walks in the garden. Gendry seems pleased at her company, which makes her happy, he’d seemed indifferent to it before. It’s been too long since she’s had a proper friend.</p>
<p>Maybe that’s why she begins to spill out her story so easily. </p>
<p>“My father died when I was eleven,” she admits one day, while watching him prune back blackberry bushes. She’d known that finishing up the deep clean of the drawing room would finish early today, and had even stashed her straw hat before leaving the house. “In an accident.”</p>
<p>“I’m sorry,” Gendry says again, and Arya wants to shake him off. She’d grieved her father plenty. As long as she’d worked here, she’s been an orphan.</p>
<p>“He was a solicitor, so we were never poorly off. But without his pay, my mum couldn’t care for six children on her own- five of us and my cousin Jon, so she had to do something.”</p>
<p>“So you ended up here?”</p>
<p>Arya grimaces. </p>
<p>“Not at first. First, we moved in with Mum’s uncle. He’s a retired Army officer, and his house was far too small for us.”</p>
<p>He doesn’t ask any further after that, and Arya’s glad. She’s glad not to have to explain about the Tully family, who still clung to some small nobility and their family estate, in shambles from neglect, despite their poverty, and how Uncle Brynden was in fact to Arya the most respectable of them, living out his days in a modest house.</p>
<p>In exchange, he tells her a little about the other gardeners. </p>
<p>“Mr Mott says he prefers older men who come with wives and homes already, says they’re less flighty. Jack and Luke both live in town and walk to work every morning.”</p>
<p>“What about you?” Arya asks, curious. She knows he doesn’t sleep in the house, even in the basement with the other men.</p>
<p>“Mr Mott and his wife have the gardener’s cottage. Because they have no children, they allow me to sleep in the upstairs room.”</p>
<p>And in this way, they become familiar bit by bit. </p>
<p>On Mrs Heddle’s last day before departure, Arya is given an extensive list of tasks that need to be done, daily, weekly, before the family is to return. And with a long speech about responsibility, Mrs Heddle pulls her enormous ring of keys, and presents Arya with the key to the closet where the dust clothes, scrubbing rags and cleaning products are kept. </p>
<p>She doesn’t let her it get her down.</p>
<p>The hall is somehow ever quieter without Mrs Heddle. It’s colder by a measure, with no need for most of the fires to even be lit, except downstairs. </p>
<p>Despite the shivering, Arya finds she prefers doing her work without feeling like she’s constantly being watched. Even if the polishing and scrubbing and dragging and dusting bleed into each other until she’s not sure where one task ends and the next begins. She cleans mirrors and scrubs and polishes clocks and basins and knick knacks, and wonders endlessly why someone would need so many things.</p>
<p>The first day she has the opportunity, she sneaks into the little room off of the Mistress’s and rifles through Sansa’s belongings, trading Northanger Abbey and Robin Hood for Ivanhoe and Jane Eyre. </p>
<p>She wrinkles her nose at the remaining book in Sansa’s possessions. She had not been a fan of Wuthuring Heights.</p>
<p>And in the quiet house, she gets to spend more time with the others in the kitchen. </p>
<p>While eating meals at the kitchen table, she watches Hot Pie.</p>
<p>“I came from the workhouse like Weasel. Glad they figured out I was good at somethin’ otherwise it would have been straight to the army with me. And I would not have done well there.”</p>
<p>No, he would not have, Arya thought to herself, watching Hot Pie’s doughy self as he kneads the dough for the next day’s bread. He only has to cook for the remaining staff now, and any free time he makes jam and pickles and the like to fill the cellars, and keeps up the kitchen, waiting for the men to come with the coal and to clean the chimney. </p>
<p>“Sharna says it’s a shame they couldn’t send me to train in France, said I could be really good one day.”</p>
<p>“Does she treat you nice?” Arya asks. </p>
<p>Hot Pie shrugs. </p>
<p>“Good as anyone has. She can’t pay me much, but it’s not like I have to pay for my bed or food. And this is the nicest kitchen I’ve ever been in.”</p>
<p>Arya can’t help by want to argue with that. She’s seen too many mice make a run for it until being met with Weasel’s broom or Willow’s knife. She takes the time to glance around. She’s never really spent a ton of time exploring the kitchen, it is pretty spacious and well-equpped. The hearth is well scrubbed, and there’s even a dumbwaiter off to one side. </p>
<p>Arya frowns. </p>
<p>“Isn’t that on the wrong side of the kitchen? The dining rooms on the other end.”</p>
<p>“Sharna says she only uses it to send up midnight snacks.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“And you’ve seen the Master,” Weasel interjects, with a mischievous grin. “Sometimes that’s a lot.”</p>
<p>Arya watches out of the corner of her eye. She’d seen houses with them before, always found them quite fascinating. Were she still a child, she doubts she would be able to resist using it to ride up and down to skip the stairs. There are far too many stairs in this house. </p>
<p>If she had any confidence in her employer’s valuing her opinion, she would suggest one just to send the laundry up and downstairs. </p>
<p>The next few days Arya stays inside as it rains. In the extra time she has to to herself, she begins Ivanhoe all over again. Sitting on the ledge in the rain is oddly pleasant, and reminds her a bit of the misty mornings at the stone house. She thinks of the some of the old stories, ones not written down, that Father had told her there. </p>
<p>And when she returns to work, she realizes that the dumbwaiter is still on the wrong side, because the opening up on the second floor, and by extrapolation, the third floor as well, are both in the guest wing. </p>
<p>She shakes her head. It’s good she didn’t decide to reread Jane Eyre, her head’s already trying to turn her life into a gothic novel.</p>
<p>A few days later, the sun returns. The morning that Arya wakes to something other than the rain pounding on the attic roof, her life brightens in another way, in a letter from Sansa. </p>
<p>(That’s one of the other things Tom does, collects and distributes the post, maintaining the confidentiality of their employer’s correspondence. Arya still doesn’t think it makes up for the amount of evenings he sneaks off and spends at the pub)<br/><i><br/>Sorry to have taken so long to write. It’s been as bad as I expected, we’re working into the wee hours, but I finally managed to grab a few minutes. </i></p>
<p>
  <i>We went to several shops the other day. It was a sight! Neither of us have ever been in a proper department store before. We went to Harrods and Tyrells and Harvey Nichols. I know you aren’t as captivated by lovely things as I am, but I’d like to think you would have at least been able to appreciate the beauty. </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>And the sitting outside while others have fun is just as awful as it was last year. But at least I’ve gotten to see some interesting people from afar. I’ve seen Hightowers and Martells and even Tyrells be introduced (after getting to see the shop the family owns at that, it’s so queer to think of things like that, of how much individual families can own and have their names on, while others don’t even have the clothes on their backs).</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>And there was a surprise guest at the last ball, the Mistresses twin brother, Captain Jamie Lannister (I could have sworn I heard she had two brothers, but perhaps I was mistaken. The Master has two brothers, Mr Stannis Baratheon and Mr Renly Baratheon. I’ve seen both of them at events as well). Captain Lannister is quite handsome, and very golden, and the Mistress did seem quite pleased to see him. I don’t think I’ve seen her this pleased before ever. </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>And I do insist that she looked quite lovely in the gown I finished for her. Eggplant taffeta with black lace on the bodice, finished with silver thread. </i>
</p>
<p>Arya smiles, thinking of the sorts of things of course Sansa would think to write about. </p>
<p>And since the sun has returned, she gets a chance that day for another walk in the garden, after another long round of sweeping ceilings and dusting the tops of booksehlves.</p>
<p>Gendry’s in the formal garden this time, after she passes Mr Mott cutting the lawn and Jack and Luke hauling another load of manure into the kitchen garden. </p>
<p>The formal walled garden is just beginning to bloom, and everything’s flush from the rain, leaves stretched and reaching for the sun. The azaleas have burst into the air, and the peonies and chrysanthemums not far behind, filling the air with their fragrance. Gendry’s pruning back some of the foliage on the carnations around a fountain. Arya likes them, they don’t smell like most flowers. </p>
<p>“I got a letter from my sister today,” she tells him.</p>
<p>Gendry grunts in acknowledgement, and Arya rolls her eyes.</p>
<p>“When we were little, I wouldn’t have believed I would ever be so happy to say that,” she admits. </p>
<p>“You two didn’t get along as children?”</p>
<p>Arya shakes her head, and almost laughs, “I think Mum would faint dead away to see how close we’ve become. When we were children, we couldn’t find even a single thing to agree on.”</p>
<p>She watches Gendry, who has moved from the carnations to another bed, and has begun laying down a wheelbarrow full of seedlings, remembering that he was an orphan like her, but an only child, no one else in the world. </p>
<p>“At the workhouse-” she starts, “-were they cruel to you there?”</p>
<p>Truthfully, all she knows of workhouses are from books. And everyone’s read Dickens, she doesn’t know if they’re the same as when he wrote of them. Weasel never spoke of the work house either, though she did sometimes speak of cruelty at the hands of the maid before Arya. </p>
<p>Gendry hmms before answering. </p>
<p>“They were more distant that cruel. I was lucky in that the institution I went to housed only children, so I wasn’t in danger. The beds were straw and the food awful. There was nothing for us but sleep, eat, work. There was school, but most of the teachers obviously didn’t want to be there, and wouldn’t hesitate to use the rod. Sometimes people would come and take us for apprenticeships, but you had no choice and there was no promise that the people who took you wouldn’t be worse. I would take it over being on the streets though. Even though I didn’t make friends, I do wonder what happened to some of the other children there.”</p>
<p>He’s silent again for a bit, stabbing his spade into the dirt. </p>
<p>“I always wanted brothers or sisters. I was never good at making friends, and thought siblings would be...well, I realized sooner or later…”</p>
<p>“That they would just be more people who could be taken away from you,” Arya finishes.</p>
<p>She feels her eyes prick with tears still at the thought, though it has been long enough that she knows that she has seemingly exhausted all the tears she has on the subject.</p>
<p>Gendry must see the change in her face, but he still keeps going. </p>
<p>“You said you had five siblings?”</p>
<p>“Four actually,” Arya says, sniffling back, “My cousin Jon lived with us, he was a brother in all but name. Robb was the oldest. My uncle managed to get both of them into the army. Robb’s dead now, in the war, and we haven’t heard from Jon in a long time. Uncle Brynden’s trying to track him down, but…”</p>
<p>The color’s drained from Gendry’s face, and his mouth gapes open. </p>
<p>“I’m sorry, I’m-”</p>
<p>Arya cuts him off. </p>
<p>“Please stop apologizing. You couldn’t know. And honestly, it’s nice to be able to talk about it without making Sansa weep.”</p>
<p>Sansa wept all the time, whenever any of them came up, or the old house, or the village, even Nan the cook. Arya felt like all of her tears had been wrung from her over the years, and she now had no more to come.</p>
<p>She takes a deep breath and continues. </p>
<p>“Robb was the oldest, then Sansa, and then me. After me is Bran, and then Rickon, who was practically a baby. They both live with my uncle still, they’re still in school.”</p>
<p>She swallows the resentment that they both got to go to secondary school, but she didn’t. She doesn’t tell him about when Bran and Rickon both fell ill while her and Sansa were here, waiting to see if there was a place for them. She’s sure it will come up soon enough. She doesn’t tell him that she sends half her pay to them, because she knew that Mum had been doing that, been doing her part to keep her youngest fed and sheltered.</p>
<p>She tells him instead about how Bran used to climb anything he could touch, even out the windows of the stone house and onto the roof. She tells him how Robb and Jon used to let her trail behind them, hitching up Father’s pony cart and pretending they were driving a chariot, or riding a team of war horses or dragons into battle. </p>
<p>“Mum despaired constantly that I was always in scrapes or covered in dirt. She used to shake her head and wonder what she would do with me.”</p>
<p>“And now you’re a maid,” Gendry comments. His comment is neutral, thankfully, rather than pointed.</p>
<p>Arya grimaces.</p>
<p>“Means I have no issue getting dirt on me, or of getting down on my knees to crawl and clean under something. I get to spare Sansa that. She gets to spend her days sewing for the Mistress, and doing her hair and dressing her.”</p>
<p>“The two of you really didn’t get along?”</p>
<p>Arya grimaces again, in memory of the childishness that marked her relationship with Sansa.</p>
<p>“We fought over everything it seemed. She always seemed to do everything exactly as she was supposed to. She was good at school, good as sewing, was always clean and neat and never spoke out of turn or said the wrong thing. And she was beautiful. She was exactly the person she was supposed to be, and I never was.”</p>
<p>Her face turns rueful. </p>
<p>“Despite that, we are both here.”</p>
<p>Gendry doesn’t say anything after that, lets her feel her despair without comment. </p>
<p>Arya watches him lay out the rest of the seedlings, She recognizes cosmos and poppies, possibly zinnias as well. The sweet peas climbing over one o the benches behind him have opened again, and fill the air with their scent. He uses his spade to cover the edges with soil, and pats them down, before reaching for the watering can and drenching them. They will sit in well, the soil around them already wet and soft and arid from the rain.</p>
<p>She’s watching intently enough, that she doesn’t realize when Gendry stands up a bit straighter and looks at her. </p>
<p>“What?” she asks, with a cocked head. </p>
<p>“Miss Arya…” she snorts, but at least Miss is better than milady, “This next Sunday is Easter...could I walk with you to church? All of us gardeners get the afternoon service.”</p>
<p>Arya does too. The morning service is attended only by the family and the senior servants. The rest had to finish all of their work in the morning, before getting the afternoon free. </p>
<p>(She usually uses her afternoon to take a bath and a nice long nap).</p>
<p>Arya smiles though. Gendry’s ears are pink in embarrassment, and his eyes are wide, awaiting her response. </p>
<p>“Weasel will be disappointed, but I suppose she could find someone else to walk with.”</p>
<p>Gendry’s eyes light up. </p>
<p>It ends up not being too much of an issue, as Weasel has become attached to Hot Pie at the hip. From eavesdropping, Arya has realized that they have come to the conclusion that the two of them have come to Red Keep from the same very workhouse, though obviously having never met because of their sex. She is grateful for this as she dresses. </p>
<p>Her Sunday best dress is pale blue with short sleeves, and this Easter morning is warm enough to not need a shawl or jacket. Her straw hat covers her hair neatly. </p>
<p>When the others begin to emerge from the servants door to walk up the path behind the house to the church, Arya finds herself looking around nervously. She doesn’t need to. </p>
<p>Gendry is scrubbed and wearing his tweed coat. He has picked a flower, one of the early sweet peas, and helps her fix it to her hat, before taking her arm.</p>
<p>Later in the day, Arya and Weasel take their baths in the kitchen, next to the fire, Hot Pie having lingered in the village after church. Once dry, Arya sits at the table, and writes back to Sansa. </p>
<p>She gives her a nice long description of how the gardens and yards are booming back to life in the spring time, before cutting to the chase.</p>
<p>
  <i>Gendry walked to church with me this morning (yes, he is the gardener I spoke to you about). </i>
</p>
<p>She laughs to herself about how Sansa would probably trip all over herself reading about that. </p>
<p>In bed that night, she watches the stars. </p>
<p>What she told Gendry was true, she often felt trapped. Even as a child, she had never been satisfied to think she would grow up, marry and keep her husband’s house, and that would be her life. And while she equally despairs at the thought of spending the rest of her life as a maid, this may be the first time in a while that her life seems like something more than a long cloudy day.</p>
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<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
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    <p>Easter is followed up by yet more rain. It seems to make Gendry happy, he says that the more rain now, the bigger the flowers will be and the easier his job will be later on. On a day of a light drizzle, Arya helps him deadhead the daffodils.</p><p>The days almost drag on a bit, as Arya’s work grows more routine, and in the rain and mist she sits, and reads or watches the grounds as they go on without anyone on them.</p><p>But eventually, the sun emerges and spring turns to summer. If Arya hadn’t already had the desire to always be outside in her bones, it would be at an absolute peak now. With the sun on her neck, she feels almost like a child playing in the woods again.</p><p>When summer is just beginning, Arya gets a letter from Bran. </p><p>
  <i>It’s quite warm out here in the west. It makes me hate being stuck inside so much even more. </i>
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</p><p>I’ve been reading a lot. Not much else to do really. Rickon takes off riding whenever he can, some days I barely see him. Seems sometimes that I might as well not have a brother, I must just have a dog that occasionally comes home for a meal.</p><p>Sorry, I don’t mean to sound so self-pitying. The doctors say I need to adjust, but they talk about it like it’s so simple and it seems like every single thing in my life needs adjusting.</p><p><i>Great Uncle Brynden says to tell you you don’t need to send your pay to keep us, but I know he appreciates it. It may not be an issue much longer. Grandfather Tully’s health is getting worse, and once he passes Uncle Brynden says Uncle Edmure would be wise to sell off the land. That and the estate would fetch enough of a sum for them to live in reasonable comfort, especially if Uncle Edmure joined us here. But I’m not sure if Uncle Brynden believes Uncle Edmure CAN be wise.</i> </p><p>Arya smiles, because Bran’s tone is brighter than it has often been, and later that day, she reads it aloud to Gendry. </p><p>“I’m still going to keep sending money though,” she admits to him, “I know there were lots of doctors bills when they both got sick.”</p><p>“You mentioned Bran being sick before,” Gendry cuts in. He’s spreading fertilizer again, along the flower bed edges. Arya wonders at everyone in Red Keep missing the gardens when they’re in the fullest of bloom. “What actually happened?”</p><p>Arya frowns a little. </p><p>“Mum had been working for her Ladyship for about six months by that time...when both positions opened up, she asked for us to be reviewed before a listing was posted. We came all the way out here...and while we were gone, Bran and Rickon both caught polio.”</p><p>She can hear the sharp intake of breath. Fear of polio was beginning to mount in families with every summer. </p><p>“Rickon recovered. The doctors said younger children usually do. Bran wasn’t so lucky.”</p><p>Gendry’s face is careful when he asks. </p><p>“How bad?”</p><p>Arya inhales. </p><p>“He can’t walk anymore. He can stand with support, but his muscles are too atrophied to even use braces, he has to have a wheelchair...they put him in a huge cast at first, no matter what the doctors say, that can’t have helped…”</p><p>She swallows a bit. Gendry’s watching her face, but remains silent. </p><p>“I didn’t even get to see him after...It would have taken years for the three of us to save up enough goodwill in order to travel by train to see him. He didn’t get to see Mum again before she…”</p><p>Tears threaten her eyes again. Maybe the pools she has of them are deeper than she could have thought. </p><p>“Thankfully, he can still write. And does.”</p><p>She thinks Bran would have liked it out here, with the big wide gardens to wander. She remembers when they were little and they would play at being knights with sticks. Arya could keep up with Jon and Robb easily enough, but Bran could outrun and out climb all of them.</p><p>“Sometimes I think if he were unlucky, he would end up like someone in one of those books, locked up in the attic so no one would ever see him.”</p><p>Gendry frowns. </p><p>“How would that work? I see people in the attic windows all the time from down here.”</p><p>Arya shakes her head. </p><p>“That’s just me, Weasel and the other maids. We’re not being hidden- well, not in the same way as the first Mrs Rochester.”</p><p>Gendry shakes his head in response though. He points to the top window on one side of the house. </p><p>“I see something moving up there in the middle of the day sometimes, well after all normal folk have begun their work days.”</p><p>Arya keeps frowning. Where he points is the opposite side of the house from the maid’s quarters. She hadn’t even realized the attic stretched that far back, it’s above the guest wing, which has been closed up since even before the Season began. But she shakes the thought off. It’s no matter getting lost in fantasies. </p><p>When summer comes and the gardens spring into bloom, Arya wonders why the master and mistress put so much into the garden when they would be gone for the part of the year it is loveliest. </p><p>“It’s status,” Gendry explains to her one afternoon, “It’s all status. Being outside, we can talk more without fearing being overheard-”</p><p>Arya gets that. Despite the staff not being supposed to speak to each other at many points during the day, gossip can still spread like wildfire. </p><p>“Apparently the best way to get yourself a top rate gardener is to poach one from another estate with gardens you admire and offer them better pay. That’s one of the reasons Mott says he likes employing older men, less chance of someone else taking a risk on them knowing they might only have ten more years service until they are blind or senile.”</p><p>Arya raises an eyebrow. </p><p>“Has anyone ever tried to steal you off?”</p><p>Gendry scoffs. </p><p>“No...I’m hardly the most friendly or approachable of workers. People who come calling usually approach the older ones. They’re more likely to be assumed to be in charge, and more often sound and look like they’re grandfathers than that grouchy neighbor they always try to avoid.”</p><p>Arya somewhat values her invisibility at this moment. She can’t imagine the awkwardness of being approached by a guest for something other than a spill or a stain. She certainly can’t imagine her work being considered so good someone might try and steal her away. She envies a bit that Gendry’s work is considered an art.</p><p>And also.</p><p>“You don’t seem unapproachable to me.”</p><p>Gendry coughs again. His ears are pink.</p><p>“You’re pretty much the first one who’s taken an interest.”</p><p>That isn’t fair either, Arya thought. That either of them should be invisible to others because of their profession. Sometimes she thinks there’s a whole half of the worlds that’s invisible to the other half.</p><p>Arya frowns. That’s not right. And if others- other girls, she thinks briefly- didn’t choose to take an interest in Gendry, that was on them.</p><p>She wanders though, if she ever does that. If there are ever parts of the world that she just does not see. </p><p>Summer blossoms on. Sansa sends more letters with loving descriptions of the balls and dinners she sees from the sidelines, and also complaints on the late nights, early mornings, pricked fingers and occasional bruise from a misstep with the mistress. </p><p>(Arya understands that beating servants is against the law now, but what good would it do bringing the law in over a smack with a hairbrush? At least that’s what Sansa told her everytime the purple bloomed on her skin)</p><p>Arya reads them all dutifully, wishing Sansa would have paid more attention when the lord and ladyship had gone to the derby. At least that might have been more than a passing interest to her. </p><p>In the middle of June, Arya’s one day off a month comes. She wakes, and blinks. It dawns on her that she doesn’t have to get up unless she wants to. She lays back and lets the sun wake her again.</p><p>She eats her porridge late, while Weasel bustles about the kitchen and Hot Pie waits for the chimney man. Arya wishes one of them had the day off too so they could go do something together, but that’s not how it works. She’s got her first quarter’s pay- given to her by Mrs Heddle before she had departed- and thinks it’s a good time to make a walk to the village. </p><p>While she leaves the front door, putting on her hat, she thinks back on her days off during the rest of the year. Most Sunday afternoons after church, she was too tired for much more than a nap. Days when sleep did not beckon to her, she would take her weekly bath, walking a quarter mile down the road to the laundry, where the servants were allowed to take baths in the wash tubs, which were always hot at least, or else to do her own washing. Without most of the household around, both her and her clothes were sparkling clean now, now that naps no longer seemed such a tempting distraction.</p><p>And when her one day off a month came, an allowance that she knew was quite generous, there was always something else that needed doing. Letters that needed to be written, money that needed to be sent, a boot that needed patching or a twisted ankle rested. Arya could count on the fingers of one hand the times she’d gotten to go down into the village just for fun.</p><p>But, today was as good a day as any, she thought as she passed the gates.</p><p>The day is clear, and the breeze blows the loose strands of Arya’s hair as she passes the laundry. She waves, but doesn’t look through the windows. Casual contact aside, Catelyn had taught her and Sansa not to stare or pay too much attention to the women who worked there, who had already faced much hardship in their lives and needed to be reborn. </p><p>When she was younger, Arya had struggled with what it was exactly that got women sent to work there, with the nuns. She understands now, but also still doesn’t, not really.</p><p>Not far past the laundry is the church. The road forks here, one pointing towards the village high street, the other going towards the park. </p><p>She thinks perhaps the park will wait for another day. Jeyne and Willow sometimes lingered there after church, watching the soldiers who were on leave, in their uniforms. Weasel had commented to Arya once, that that was where quite a lot of the boys in her workhouse ended up being sent. They were enlisted in the army and sent off to all corners of the globe to shoot at men they had never met. </p><p>She’ll save the park, maybe for the warmest days of summer. </p><p>She walks onto the high street, past all the usual shops. The butcher’s, the grocery, the baker. The blacksmith shop now has a storefront littered with toys and tools as well as things made out of iron. She sticks her head in there, but finds nothing of particular interest. </p><p>The last shop in the newsstand, where the papers under the awning hide a tiny bookshop. Arya has to duck to get in, with a nod to the stout man at the counter. </p><p>She passes by the penny dreadfuls, now coming to agreement with Mum that she had once fought her so loudly over. They were, in fact, awful. She browses the shelves, seeking another adventure to take up the sunny summer days. </p><p>She eventually finds two, one promising knights, the other kings and plots. She hopes they’re as good as they look. </p><p>She pays and is just exiting the store, when she notices a commotion across the street. When she had entered, she hadn’t paid too much attention to the figure with the sign reading “Votes for Women,” but being she was now being cornered by two policemen and they were all exchanging very loud, very cross words.</p><p>Arya feels her blood rush through her ears, and for a moment she’s pulled by the desire to jump in and help the woman. She holds herself back, knowing it would do no good. Best case, they’d both be arrested, worse, she’d be sacked through the post and left on the street, no where to go.</p><p>The woman’s lingering in her mind as she returns to Red Keep though. </p><p>Before returning to the big house, she walks the gardens to find Gendry, who’s trimming hedges in the main garden. </p><p>He nods politely, and Arya lets herself trail off during her rundowns of the plot.</p><p>“You’re not much of a reader?”</p><p>Gendry’s ears go pink again. </p><p>“‘Fraid not. I read well enough to not get smacked during lessons, but I never found any fun in it.”</p><p>Arya frowns. </p><p>“Well maybe you’ll need to find some better books, I’ll loan you Robin Hood, you can give it a try.”</p><p>Gendry does smile at that. </p><p>“I can see you liking Robin Hood, with your stories of childish adventure play.”</p><p>Arya grins in return. </p><p>“Robbing from the rich, giving to the poor, out riding, out shooting and outsmarting any man who came against me. It was a dream.”</p><p> </p><p>Her grin slips a bit. </p><p>“I used to thinks books were boring too. Mum was always on me to read more to improve my mind, but I was more interested in riding or playing. The things I did read, she thought were rubbish... Then, after a point, whenever I wanted to go with my brothers and have fun, all everyone wanted to tell me that I was too young or too small or a girl, so I had to make my own adventures. And now...no one writes stories about people like us, because we’d make a pretty sorry sort of book heroes.”</p><p>Gendry can’t find fault with that. </p><p>Arya begins both books over tea. The Prisoner of Zenda is promising, but despite the title, she is much less enthused by When Knighthood was in Flower. It’s to the extent that when she dressed in her nightdress and lying in bed, she realizes she left it down in the kitchen. </p><p>The hike back down seems to take an hour. Some days Arya thinks she should keep count of how many steps she takes on these stairs, as it must add up to miles. </p><p>It’s late enough that the fire’s out, and the door to where Hot Pie sleeps is closed. Her book sits just where she left it on the table. She reaches out to grab it so quickly that she doesn’t hear the wood creaking, or hear the movement in the kitchen until the small figure crosses in front of her eyes.</p><p>She yells, in a girlish manner she will later deny, and reverts to a childish reflex; when frightened, shove. </p><p>Her shoving is fruitful, as the figure falls to the ground with a “oof.”</p><p>“Who the hell are you?” Arya demands, regaining her composure. </p><p>The figure groans again. </p><p>“No one.”</p><p>Arya snorts. The figure’s the size of a child, but the voice is clearly that of a grown man. While he is on the floor, Arya gropes for a match and a candle by the stove, and lights it. </p><p>The man who stands has pale hair and an aged face. He is also, clearly, a dwarf. </p><p>“Well you don’t work here, I would know. And you certainly aren’t acting like you broke in- though if Tom’s down at the pub instead of keeping watch again, you could be. So I ask again- who are you?”</p><p>With the candle lit, Arya can see in the kitchen again. She can see the man standing next to a tray of food, and she can see the dumbwaiter door sitting open. The wheels in her mind start turning at incredible speed. </p><p>“You live in the attic,” she comes to the conclusion, “On the far side, over the guest wing.”</p><p>She stares him down, though he appears much older than her. </p><p>“Not going to deny it? Try to convince me you’re a spectre or a ghost, or some other figment of my fragile female mind?”</p><p>She is rewarded with a chuckle. The man sits down, and pops open a bottle. </p><p>“You’re a maid, I measure?” Arya nods, trying to maintain her cross face. </p><p>The man shakes his head. </p><p>“My sister would of course, underestimate the intelligence of her household staff.”</p><p>Sister, Arya’s brain is still scurrying. She’s trying to remember something Sansa told her, but…</p><p>Well, she guesses it would be much better to listen. </p><p>The man finds two cups and pours from the bottle on the tray, passing one towards Arya. </p><p>“You should sit down, it’s a bit of a long story.”</p><p>Arya does as suggested, and sips from the cup. It’s wine, possibly one made here, kept in the cellar and locked away, checked only by the senior servants. She knows Mrs Heddle keeps a close eye on the numbers. She must know about the small man.</p><p>“I think before you lay in, you could at least tell me your name.”</p><p>He nods.</p><p>“I have been called many names, many of them quite cruel. My Christian name, as much as my father would admit to it, is Tyrion Lannister.”</p><p>Arya nods. </p><p>“I am Arya Stark.”</p><p>Arya fidgets, but listens to every word of his story. His mother’s death does tug at her heart strings, but she chooses not to interrupt. The stories of his cold treatment at the hands of his father and sister do not surprise her. Even having only met the latter briefly, she did not find her warm.</p><p>“I was bright, I always was, but my father would have been dead before he spent any of the family fortune on a member he thought of as an embarrassment, so university was out.”</p><p>“What did you end up doing?”</p><p>Tyrion grimaces. </p><p>“Wandered while I could. Drank a lot, met many disreputable women. Did some work with a circus. My brother Jamie helped when I needed funds, and I never used my real name…”</p><p>“Did you like it? Being in the circus?”</p><p>He grimaces even harder. </p><p>“It was a mixed bag.”</p><p>Arya taps her foot. This is a story to be sure, but not one she’s sure where it’s leading. </p><p>“So how did you end up back in your sister’s house, living in her attic?”</p><p>Tyrion sighs. </p><p>“A few years ago, in a fit of sentimentality, I returned home for my father’s funeral. During this time, I discovered something which would have seriously harmed my family’s reputation if it got out.”</p><p>He glances up towards Arya’s face. </p><p>“You’ll understand that I best keep this to myself, Miss Stark, we just met.”</p><p>Arya nods slightly, almost chafing at him calling her “Miss”. </p><p>“And in exchange for my silence, my dear sister allows me to stay here, as long as no one outside of maybe two staff members, knows. My food is sent up, or sometimes I come down at night for a tray of leftover’s the boy leaves out-”</p><p>Arya makes a face. </p><p>“Hot Pie made that tray earlier,” she interjects, “He doesn’t know your eating it?”</p><p>She pauses, then chuckles. Hot Pie is not exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer.</p><p>“It could be worse,” Tyrion adds, “The kitchen boy before him thought I must be a thieving faerie.”</p><p>Arya watches him for a bit. </p><p>“So you’re...accepting of your situation? You would be content to live in an attic the rest of your life?”</p><p>Tyrion shrugs.</p><p>“It could be worse. I can read as much as I like, I can send for all sorts of books through the post. And correspondence courses- all sorts available for all the things I wanted to learn but never could. Besides. My sister won’t live forever.”</p><p>Arya finishes up her cup of wine, and realizes it’s quite late. </p><p>“I should be getting to bed.”</p><p>She stands and studies him before leaving. She wonders if she should tell Sansa that the mice she hears are in fact quite a bit larger. </p><p>But her question to him lingers in her mind for the rest of the summer. </p><p>A few days after discovering their companion in the attic, Arya brings her copy of Robin Hood to Gendry. </p><p>“Read it at your leisure, I’ve read it dozens of times already.”</p><p>Gendry flips through it, somewhat daunted. </p><p>“It’s sort of long.”</p><p>Arya nods.</p><p>“If you need to give it back and everyone’s come back and we can’t see each other hardly at all, leave it on the ledge when you trim the roses, I’ll find it again.”</p><p>He does smile, and tucks the book into his coat pocket. Arya beams in response, and they hold the gaze for a few beats longer. It makes Arya’s insides feel warm. </p><p>It’s nice, it’s been nice, this whole summer, and it makes Arya go cold when she realizes how close it is to coming to an end. Her daily routine is borderline light now, and she can hum or sing or pretend she’s a secret assassin hiding in a castle while dusting and no one will care. Her meals are pleasant and light-heated, shared with Hot Pie and Weasel with even an occasional laugh. </p><p>And Gendry. </p><p>She’ll hardly even get to see him once the household returns. Maybe a moment or two, stolen away when she can hide among the roses. </p><p>This is what is weighing on her the day Sansa’s letter comes. </p><p>She’d been in the garden after dinner with Gendry, discussing the first chapter of Robin Hood. </p><p>“There’s loads of Robin Hood stories that aren’t in the book too,” she tells him, “Father told me one about when Marian sought out Robin in the forest in disguise when they had been separated. When he didn’t recognize her, they fought, and she fought him to a draw before he finally caught on.”</p><p>And he smiles, and it warms her. </p><p>And so, Arya is in a brighter mood than usual when she returns to the house, and finds the letter waiting. She tears open and reads the paper while drinking a cup of tea.</p><p>Her face falls.</p><p>
  <i>...been kicked out of yet another school. It’s been decided that Joffrey should spend his final year before university at Red Keep, being taught by tutors….</i>
</p><p>Arya slumps in her chair and holds her head in her hands.</p>
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